Graphics Card on Windows 7 on MBP

Solution 1:

I have VMware and it does support native use of the video card. Boot Camp, of course, supports all of your Mac's hardware as well once you install the Apple driver set. I do not regularly play games anymore, so I cannot speak to how well something like Call of Duty would perform. What I can talk about is how well Windows performs in general when using VMware versus using Boot Camp.

When I had the stock amount of memory on my MBP (4 GB), Windows seemed to be "dragging" under VMware. Under Boot Camp it ran great. The main app that I use on Windows is Visual Studio, which is pretty resource intensive--although perhaps not as much as a game.

Once I added the maximum amount of memory that my MBP can take (8 GB), VMware's performance became respectable. I can now use Visual Studio side by side with the rest of Mac OS X and it doesn't feel "dragging" anymore. Of course, when I switch to Boot Camp I can tell the difference right away--with 8 GB of RAM this MBP became the best Windows PC I have ever had.

In summary, if you have a sufficient amount of RAM, I would give it a shot under VMware for gaming. But Boot Camp will always be your best bet. Hope this helps.